Wildcats focus on themselves

El Dorado’s basketball week was unexpectedly open after Hot Springs and Pine Bluff canceled games due to COVID. Those games have been tentatively rescheduled, Hot Springs at Wildcat Arena on Saturday, Jan. 23 and at Pine Bluff on Thursday, Jan. 28. Both games start at 5 p.m. with varsity girls.

In the meantime, both El Dorado teams spent the week practicing, working on weaknesses and looking ahead to Tuesday’s game at Texarkana.

Wildcats’ coach Jimmy Porter planned to make the week productive. He was asked about the makeup games, though, especially the thought of playing three games in a week and on back-to-back days.

“You’ve got to be honest and open with your teams. Those conversations you have, you’ve got to make them realistic from the standpoint, fellas, when we get into tournament play, this is how it’s going to be,” Porter said. “When we get into the conference tournament, the state tournament, you’re playing back-to-back-to-back games. It’s going to be a grind. Hey, we weren’t able to have a tournament this year. We haven’t had the opportunity to even talk about playing back-to-back. So, to me, that’s going to be a tool I use to teach the team. Here’s how we prepare to play back-to-back days, when we have games on back-to-back days. I think we’ll be able to carry that concept into the conference tournament and into the state tournament.”

Porter said the Wildcats spent the week focusing on themselves. They began preparing for Texarkana in the latter stages.

“Very athletic team, Coach Weaver does a good job with them,” he said. “They do some different stuff defensively that we haven’t seen, yet. It’s probably good that we have a couple extra days to prepare for that.”

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